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It takes a global network to unleash the power of exponential technologies in health.

Our team-member Jules Lancee wrote a great blog explaining our past and current effort to set stage for a Global Network of Health Innovation Centers (GNHIC).

Radboudumc REshape Center is the initiator and the founding host of the newly formed Global Network of Health Innovation Centers (GNHIC). The network was created by leading health systems’ innovation teams to jointly explore emerging technologies in healthcare that have the potential to “exponentially” impact patient health. Technologies like artificial intelligence, blockchain, virtual and augmented reality are underpinned by software that scales exponentially; given the average time for new things to get adopted at scale in healthcare is 17 years, these emerging technologies require new approaches in order to unleash their potential. The types of issues and barriers to be faced are so multiplicative and tough, it takes a global network to tackle them in concert. Here is an overview of what GNHIC is, how it started, and what we aim to do in the next year ….

How did GNHIC start?

In late 2015, the Radboudumc REshape Center convened innovation leaders from leading edge health systems in a workshop at the Singularity University Exponential Medicine conference in San Diego. From discussions and debates, many of the challenges innovation centers in healthcare all around the world faced were the same. So why not collaborate more, was the generic conclusion. We aligned on the need for particular attention to the potential impact of exponential technologies in health. Radboudumc REshape agreed to take the ideas away and soft launch the Global Network of Health Innovation Centers in 2016.

The founding members all seek a strong facility in exploring, testing, adopting and scaling exponential technologies, jointly solving common organizational challenges like policy regimes, legal barriers, HR and innovation KPIs. During Zayna Khayat’s secondment to the Radboudumc REshape Center Lucien Engelen asked her to take GHNIC into the next level as one of her core projects.

Who are the founding members?

These are the founding members of the GNHIC, representing leading health systems and innovation brokers in the EU, North America and Singapore.

What Emerging Technologies is the network focused on?

These 7 technologies were identified to have the most relevance, right now, for the members of the network.

What is the network focused on doing?

During the actual exploration phase the founding members identified three main streams or pillars of activity:

I. Explore Staying on top of the key exponentials, their development and tracking the use cases where they are being deployed with patients in the real world.

II. Learn Building capacity by curating and developing needed tools, methodologies, and training materials, etc to test and adopt exponential technology in health and care.

III. Do Jointly work in small sub-clusters on testing and implementing technologies to maximize learnings, refine methodologies, and amplify capacity building.

What’s next?

In the coming 6 months, the network is focused on starting to activate the 3 pillars above, and “get its groove”. We have a few initiatives that we are focused on:

‘Exponential TechTuesdays’ – a monthly global training webinar. The GNHIC joined forces with the Innovation Learning Network (ILN) to extend their Virtual TechTuesdays series by adding an “exponential tech Tuesdays” arm. The monthly series will focus exclusively on demystifying key exponentials, and providing training for health systems on how to unleash the potential to impact patients. Each exponential will be examined via a powerful one hour webinar with experts and experienced practitioners from within and outside the GNHIC and ILN networks. Apart from explaining the technology these webinars will explain why patients and health system players should care, describe relevant use cases and showcase emerging innovators in the field.